Nandini Raghav1 , Riddhi Jaiswal2 , Nisha Singh3 , Amita Pandey4
BACKGROUND Cervical cancer screening programs are active in most countries, and is more important in India because of the large incidence of cervical cancer here. Association with Human Papilloma Virus has also been well established. However, host immune response and hence role of Programmed Death Ligand receptors are being investigated extensively. METHODS We included 100 cases of in situ and invasive cervical cancer, with proper prior consent after obtaining institutional ethical clearance. Histopathological diagnosis, in light of clinico-radiological findings were correlated with PDL1 expression (Dako) on paraffin embedded tissue by immunohistochemistry. RESULTS We found that there was stronger expression of PD-L1 (membranous and cytoplasmic) in malignant cases as compared to premalignant cases and difference in score and grade among premalignant and malignant cases was found to be statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS This study supports the theory that expression of PD-L1 can serve as a potent mechanism for potentially immunogenic tumours to escape from host immune responses.
